Analyzing and refuting the inaccuracies lodged against the lgbt community by religious conservative organizations. Lies in the name of God are still lies.

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Shooting at the Family Research Council - ALL violence (physical and spiritual) must be condemned

By now, you have probably heard what happened today at the headquarters of the Family Research Council.

Earlier today, a 28-year-old man came in pretending to be an intern. On his person, he had two guns. The security guard fought him and kept him from fully using these guns, at the expense of getting wounded.

According to reports, the young man committed this act because he disagreed with the Family Research Council's anti-gay stance.

First of all, let me say that I totally condemn what this young man did. Violence is never the answer. The security guard, who is in stable condition, is also in my prayers. He is a hero for what he did. Finally, I am glad that the situation did not get worse.

However, let me also say that while I condemn physical violence, I also condemn spiritual violence.

And in that respect, something must be said about the Family Research Council.

For years, many have said that stances and the language used by organizations like the Family Research Council against the gay community to defend these stances had the danger of empowering violent anti-gay behavior from those on the fringes of the right.

Now comes this new dynamic. It can also empower violent behavior from the fringes of the other side too.

The Family Research Council will have people to believe that it is an organization which simply stands up for family and morality. But we all know not to be true.

Of course now in the conservative circles, there seems to be a call for SPLC to rescind this designation.

I have to ask why.

Will the Family Research Council do some soul searching after what happened today? Will it publicly apologize for all the lies it has told on the gay community? Will leaders of the organization realize that their tone does more to inflame hatred from all sides rather than spread respect and understanding? Will they realize that maybe they should stop using junk science or distorting legitimate science against the gay community?

I doubt it. And it is for that reason that while I will freely pray for the organization after this awful incident, I will not give the Family Research Council the satisfaction of me forgetting all of the things it has said and done to unfairly demonize me and my brothers and sisters in the name of its God.

As far as I am concerned, the Family Research Council is still a hate group. And that won't change in my mind unless the organization changes.

6 comments:

Unfortunately for the gay community, for the FRC, this is the best thing that could happen to them. We will NEVER hear the end of this. The FRC and countless other anti-gay groups will continue to use this incident to demonize and paint us as gun toting psychopaths ready to kill who we disagree with. Now FRC is going to play the victim as always, and I'm really starting to fear that this will ultimately help the public perception of FRC with all the victim playing. They will completely downplay everything they stand for and just say they're an innocent organization who has an opinion and that everyone should feel bad for them. And I think everyone will. You can go a long way with manipulation. And FRC are experts when it comes to that

The response to that (coming from a strongly pro-life, pro-gay, liberal) is that you you can't no more make generalized statements about this violent act than someone can make statements about the nuts who went and shot abortionists. As you said, those were people on the fringe. 99.9% of activists in either of these groups don't believe in that.

I can't believe you are blaming the victim here. You don't condemn the violence, you try to explain it. There is no justification for what that asshole tried to do. This is juat the latest in a long line of attacks by gays on Christians. Look in the mirror and blame yourself.

Anonymous, no one is blaming the "victim" here. HOWEVER, to attempt to use this incident to exonerate the Family Research Council for its many years of homophobia and lies is wrong. BTW u claim that this incident is the latest in a long line of attacks on Christians by gays. I am interested. Let's hear about this supposed long line.

About Me

Alvin McEwen is 45-year-old African-American gay man who resides in Columbia, SC.
McEwen's blog, Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters, and writings have been mentioned by Americablog.com, Goodasyou.org, People for the American Way, PageOneQ.com, The Washington Post, Raw Story, The Advocate, Media Matters for America, Crooksandliars.com, Thinkprogress.org, Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish, Melissa Harris-Perry, The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, Newsweek, The Daily Beast, The Washington Blade, and Foxnews.com.
In addition, he is also a past contributor to Pam's House Blend,Justice For All, LGBTQ Nation, and Alternet.org. He is a present contributor to the Daily Kos and the Huffington Post,
He is the 2007 recipient of the Harriet Daniels Hancock Volunteer of the Year Award and the 2010 recipient of the Order of the Pink Palmetto from the SC Pride Movement as well as the 2009 recipient of the Audre Lorde/James Baldwin Civil Rights Activist Award from SC Black Pride. In addition, he is a three-time nominee of the Ed Madden Media Advocacy Award from SC Pride.